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China AI Race: US Six Months Behind, Says Ex-Google CEO
21 Oct
Summary
- China trails US in AI by six months but leads in adoption.
- Chinese AI models are cheaper, posing a threat to US systems.
- US chip export controls are reportedly failing to curb China's AI.
As of October 21, 2026, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt has assessed that China is approximately six months behind the United States in artificial intelligence capabilities. However, Schmidt warns that China's AI race advantage stems from its lower-cost and free open-weight models, which are poised to attract a larger global user base than U.S. proprietary systems.
Schmidt's assessment, shared recently, narrows the previously perceived gap of one to two years. He attributed China's progress despite hardware limitations to sophisticated software innovations and workarounds, citing examples like DeepSeek and distillation techniques. He also expressed concerns that U.S. chip export controls are proving ineffective.
This analysis aligns with other recent reports. An Institute for Progress study similarly placed the U.S. six months ahead in frontier AI models. Demis Hassabis, co-founder of Google DeepMind, also recently indicated a six-month lag for Chinese AI firms compared to Western counterparts.
